Snapdragon Inn blog

Thoughts when I look at this picture. 1. The contrast of my mop hair and his product hair is awesome. 2. Where did those earrings go? 3. I've never seen him wear glasses.

Two years ago, Gordon Ramsay was in the area filming a show and he stayed with us during his week long visit. You can see the original blog post here. I get excited just remembering that time. I have been a fan of Mr. Ramsay since I got sucked into a binge viewing of "Kitchen Nightmare's" after my son was born and I was awake all the time. That led to a binge viewing of "the F-word" (his UK show) and has finally rested with my loyalty to "Master Chef".

Anyhow, he was incredibly busy during his stay but was complimentary of the Inn and very personable and funny. Did he swear? Why, yes he did but it made me giggle and was endearing. He requested bran muffins which we did not have at the Inn so I was elected to make some. That is some pressure there. It was like my own private quick fire (oh, wrong cooking reality show) and I didn't want to make him spit them out in disgust. I carefully chose the freshest ingredients and stocked up on KIng Arthur Flour. Then they actually would be local since King Arthur HQ is just down the road from us in Norwich, Vermont.

I settled on this recipe from King Arthur Flour and at 10PM I whipped up a batch of muffins so he could have them in the morning. I contemplated waking up at 4AM to make them but I had a baby and a toddler at the time and that wasn't going to happen.

I didn't really see much of Gordon that week but made a few batches of muffins so there were fresh ones available. On the day of his departure, we had a brief chat. He asked where I had been all week and I said I had two young kids to which he replied, "brilliant" and "well done". As he walked up the stairs he said, "I love this place" and then when he came back down he said the "muffins were delicious". So there you have it folks, edge of your seat sort of stuff huh?

It had been a little hush-hush that he was staying with us so the moment he was out the door, we facebook and tweeted the spit out of it (we still are) and he so kindly tweeted back that he "loved it. many thanks". How do we know it was really him? Firstly, it was a very quick re-tweet- almost immediate, really. Secondly, he signs his tweets, "Gx" and thirdly, after a week with Gordon, he was our friend.